Dam it, Joe

Why Biden’s Secret Plan to Destroy Lower Snake River Dams is a Bad One

“We can invent a new fish-flavored ice cream to raise money for species restoration. It’ll be called Salmonilla.” -Joe Biden, possibly. 

Leaked court documents reveal that the Biden administration has been secretly negotiating with tribal nations and environmental groups to destroy four hydroelectric dams on the Lower Snake River (LSR) in the name of saving salmon.

Unfortunately, the administration is using a controversial tactic called “sue and settle,” This tactic allows special interest groups to achieve regulatory or policy goals through litigation—in secret—and bypass the legislative and regulatory processes. 

While the dams are unlikely to be destroyed in the near future because doing so would require Congressional approval, a 2022 joint report from the Washington Policy Center and American Experiment concluded that destroying the four LSR dams and replacing them with 100 percent onshore wind, solar, and battery storage would cost Washington residents an additional $34.3 billion through 2050. This increase would lead to a massive 24 percent increase in electricity prices, forcing the average family to pay an additional $242 per year for their electricity. 

To make matters worse, research shows that there are a multitude of factors that affect salmon recovery rates, such as availability of habitat, water temperatures, and predation from seals and sea lions, and that destroying the LSR dams would have minimal impact on salmon populations.  

This makes the Biden Administration’s politically motivated attempts to destroy the dams an enormous expense for minimal environmental gain. 

Background 

Washington state had the 7th lowest electricity prices in the United States in 2020 and the lowest carbon dioxide emissions from the electricity sector for any state in the nation. These economic and environmental feats were only possible because the original New Deal was very green, resulting in the construction of the Grand Coulee and Bonneville dams. 

The Grand Coulee Dam Circa 1947 

Hydroelectric dams continue to be the largest source of power in Washington to this day, providing 66 percent of total in-state electricity generation in 2020, but several groups have advocated for removing the four LSR dams Ice Harbor, Little Goose, Lower Granite, and Lower Monumental to aid in salmon recovery efforts. 

The four LSR dams have a combined capacity of 3,033 megawatts (MW) and constitute 10 percent of the installed capacity in Washington State. However, these run-of-river dams only accounted for 4.68 percent of the state’s power generation in 2021, the most recent year data available when we did our modeling in 2022 due to a low water year. 

A map of the four LSR dams in Washington 

American Experiment modeled two scenarios for replacing the electricity generated by the LSR dams: one that relies on onshore wind, solar, and battery storage, called the Renewable Scenario, and one that replaces the dams using natural gas, called the NG Scenario. Our model calculated the generation mix needed to replace the electricity generated from the LSR dams for every hour of 2021 using the resource mixes in both scenarios. 

Replacing the Lower Snake River Dams with Renewables or Natural Gas 

Under the Renewable Scenario, Washington electricity providers would be required to invest heavily in wind, solar, and battery storage technologies to make up for destroying the dams. Figure 1 shows the resource mix needed to replace the dams under the Renewable Scenario in a hypothetical situation in 2028 after the LSR dams have been destroyed. 

The black line shows the 2021 hourly electricity production from the LSR dams, obtained from the Army Corp of Engineers, during a hypothetical week in 2028 after the dams have been destroyed. This hourly demand must be matched by the hourly generation from wind, solar, and battery storage to maintain the same level of reliability as the LSR dams. 

Wind and solar generation data were modeled using real-world 2021 hourly capacity factors of these resources in the Bonneville Power Administration (BPA) territory during the dates depicted in Figure 1. These dates were selected because they show the days when battery storage is needed most to match generation from the LSR dams. Any wind and solar generation that exceeds the LSR dam generation is used to charge the batteries on the system. 

Once the batteries are fully charged, any additional solar or wind power that is generated is curtailed or turned off. Curtailment is expected to become increasingly common as more wind and solar are installed on the grid. 

In the NG Scenario, Washington would replace the generation from the LSR dams with new natural gas power plants, which are capable of being turned up and down to match fluctuations in electricity generation from the LSR dams, shown in black in Figure 2. 

Notice that the Y-axis for Figure 1 is much higher than in Figure 2. This is because matching the hourly output of the LSR dams with non-dispatchable resources, those that can’t be started on command, requires a massive overbuilding of wind, solar, and battery capacity to ensure reliable electricity generation when the wind isn’t blowing very hard or the sun isn’t shining very brightly. 

Figure 3 shows the Renewable Scenario would require a total of 17,006 MW of installed capacity, 2,137 MW of onshore wind, 6,056 MW of solar, and 8,813 MW of four-hour lithium-ion batteries, to replicate the generation of the 3,033 MW LSR dams.  

Notice that the Y-axis for Figure 1 is much higher than in Figure 2. This is because matching the hourly output of the LSR dams with non-dispatchable resources, those that can’t be started on command requires a massive overbuilding of wind, solar, and battery capacity to ensure the generation of adequate electricity when the wind isn’t blowing very hard or the sun isn’t shining very brightly. 

Figure 3 shows that the Renewable Scenario would require a total of 17,006 MW of installed capacity, 2,137 MW of onshore wind, 6,056 MW of solar, and 8,813 MW of four-hour lithium-ion batteries to replicate the generation of the 3,033 MW LSR dams. 

It is important to note that our model selected these quantities of solar, wind, and battery storage resources because they were the most cost-effective portfolio for matching the electricity generated by the LSR dams with carbon-free resources and maintaining grid reliability under 2021 LSR dam electricity generation and real-world wind and solar generation conditions. 

The NG scenario would require less capacity than the current dams because natural gas plants can be easily turned on or off to meet demand 

For context, Washington had roughly 30,688 MW of installed power plant capacity on its grid in 2020, meaning the Renewable Scenario would require Washington to increase the installed capacity on its electric grid by 55 percent to replace the hourly output from the LSR dams that constituted 4.61percent of the state’s total electricity generation in 2021. 

Unsurprisingly, drastically expanding the installed capacity on the Washington grid would be incredibly expensive. 

The Cost 

Five main factors affect the cost of adding new generation capacity to the electricity grid:  

• capital costs for the new power plants 

• operation and maintenance (O&M) expenses associated with new power facilities 

• utility profits vertically integrated monopolies earn on building this new infrastructure 

• additional transmission costs associated with building the wind and solar resources 

• additional property taxes owed by utility companies because they now have much more property to tax. 

Figure 4 shows the additional costs of building and operating the grids built in the Renewable Scenario and the NG Scenario from 2022 through 2050, on top of the costs already paid by Washington consumers for the rest of their generation fleet. As you can see, the Renewable Scenario costs 3.5 times more than the NG Scenario due to spending $2.1 billion on additional transmission costs, $15.1 billion on additional capital costs, $8.7 billion on additional fixed operation and maintenance costs, $1 billion in additional transmission costs, and $7.4 billion for additional utility profits. 

The NG Scenario costs $10.3 billion through 2050, but this is largely because we conducted this report in 2021, when natural gas prices were $9 per million British thermal units (MMBtu). Today, natural gas prices are less than $3 per MMBtu, meaning the fuel costs in Figure 4 could reasonably be reduced to around $2 billion instead of $6.2 billion, reducing the total cost of the NG Scenario to around $6.3 billion. 

Rising Rates for Consumers 

The total cost of replacing the generation of the LSR dams with 100 percent wind, solar, and battery storage would be $34.3 billion, causing electricity rates to increase from 8.33 cents per kilowatt hour (kWh) in 2020 to 10.34 cents per kWh by 2028, an increase of 2.01 cents per kWh, a nearly 24 percent increase. Under this scenario, Washington would go from having the country’s 7th lowest total electricity prices in 2020 to the 18th highest in 2028.  

Averaged out over the 28 years studied, Washington families would see their average electricity bill increase by an average of $242 per year through 2050. Residential customers under the NG Scenario would see an average additional cost of $73 per year compared to the current electric grid, an increase of about $6 per month. 

Other Damage 

Removing the LSR dams wouldn’t just increase electricity rates for families and businesses across Washington. It would also require the investment of billions to replace the transportation it provides today, in addition to other services that are based around the dams, according to a 2020 PNWA report. 

As the report notes, “No funding for these improvements has been identified, and all of these improvements are considered to be national costs that would not otherwise be required if the LSR (Lower Snake River) locks remain in operation.” 

Furthermore, due to the prohibitive costs that make it unlikely that wind, solar, and battery storage will fully take on the lost electricity generation of the dams, removal of them will likely lead to higher CO₂ emissions.

Destroying the Dams Won’t Save the Salmon 

Incurring these massive cost increases might be worth it if destroying the dams were a silver-bullet solution guaranteed to restore salmon populations on the Snake River, but this simply isn’t the case.  

Todd Myers, the Director of the Center for the Environment at the Washington Policy Center, is also a member of the Puget Sound Salmon Recovery Council and is one of the most results-oriented and data-driven people in the salmon recovery space in Washington State. In his Congressional Testimony, Myers wrote that federal scientists don’t even believe the LSR dams should be removed: 

“The most comprehensive study of the impact of the dams ever completed, the Columbia River System Operations Environmental Impact Statement, determined the dams should not be removed. That study concluded keeping the dams would “meet the Improve Juvenile Salmon, Improve Adult Salmon, and Improve Lamprey objectives.” 

To understand why the EIS supported keeping the dams and why focusing on the Snake River dams is counterproductive, it is important to understand the current state of salmon runs. The Seattle Times recently noted, “The state and tribes have invested millions to raise hatchery fish, restore critical habitat, keep rivers cool and clean up industrial and agricultural pollution. Yet the efforts haven’t been enough to keep the river open to fishing this summer…”   

The story wasn’t about the Snake River, but the Snohomish River in Western Washington, where no dams exist. While some are fixated on the status of salmon on the Snake River, the unfortunate reality is that salmon across the Pacific Northwest are struggling.   

The challenge Washington and neighboring states face is that recovery is complex and we have to address numerous factors. Lack of quality habitat – good estuaries and floodplains or fish barriers like culverts – is one problem. High water temperatures in streams is another threat. A report this year from the Washington State Academy of Scientists noted that the number of Chinook being eaten by seals and sea lions is “substantial and has increased steadily,” concluding that “predation is considered a primary driver of increasing mortality rates.” 

Unfortunately, salmon populations are struggling throughout the Pacific Northwest regardless of whether the rivers have dams or not, and the Biden administration’s politically motivated attempts to destroy the LSR dams will expend massive amounts of money for minimal environmental progress.  

Conclusion 

The Biden administration’s singular focus on destroying the LSR dams through a secretive sue-and-settle scheme is a disservice to government transparency, the idea of an elected democracy, and everyone who relies on the dams for electricity, transportation, or recreation. It would be a disservice to the salmon, which would benefit more from investing this money in habitat restoration, programs designed to plant trees along the river to reduce water temperatures, and initiatives to reduce the seal and sea lion populations that are considered a primary reason for higher salmon mortality.